You'll never come up with a totally original idea, so don't worry about taking ideas from other places. As long as you don't take somebody else's story and just change the names or characters/places, you're good.The main character for the book I'm writing is actually a mixture of several characters that I've taken inspiration from. It's always good to wear your inspiration on your sleeve, perhaps even giving a nod to those who inspired you should you ever be published.

Something I've also learned while writing this book: don't be afraid to ditch complete chapters/ideas when you get stuck. Starting the chapter from scratch, using new and better ideas, can really help break that barrier you were stuck behind.Just don't delete the ideas you ditch, keep them in an easily accessible file for later use.

I have only just realised this thread existed. I am currently writing a story myself, as well as designing a couple of characters and locations for it. It will be nothing fancy or anything, and my literacy capabilities are somewhat lacking too. All of these things aside though, I'm having a great time creating a whole world full of my own ideas and references to things that have inspired me along the way.

So I was playing a bit of Final Fantasy IX. It started me thinking about that sort of medieval fantasy, and I came up with this not very sizeable scene. I'm trying to flesh it out (and it's only been lightly rewritten) but should anyone care to give it a look, a fresh pair of eyes to ravage it would be lovely.

The probability of anyone actually reading this is...well. It's quite low. Lower than Madonna's hemline. Lower than Megan Fox's IQ. Lower than the average gross takings of a Shyamalan. But still. Here is something well useful I found:

I have a silly idea that I'm going to turn into my first screenplay. I'll use that to prove I can do it before writing up my better ideas. Hoping to have the planning done this week and then start next week. Never done it before so I'm learning as I go, what free screenwriting software would you guys recommend?

I've only written short stories in the past. At this stage I'm pretty comfortable with the format and feel like expanding, maybe a novelette. I always find the most difficult part of writing a story is the beginning, if I get stuck there I have a terrible habit of giving up almost straight away.

PsychicSykes wrote:I'd love to able to write but I seem to get so far into something before realising I've subconciously ripped something off from somewhere else, getting irritated and deleting it from my hard drive. Any tips for writing original stuff?

This happens to me all the strawberry floating time. And it doesn't help that the idea is what I usually find to be the most challenging part of writing, not the execution. I always think that my inspirations will be so blatantly obvious to the point of distraction. Then of course I start to view whatever I'm writing as simply an inferior version of the original source. Very frustrating. Suppose it's just something I need to learn to let not get to me or I may end up never writing anything substantial.

I have a few chapters done of something called The Human Component, which is a near future cyberpunk story. It was difficult at first, however I have since sketched out a rough story arc and can now write using that as a guide. All you need to do is know where you are, know where you want to be next and focus on getting there while still managing to give some development time to the world and characters while doing so. Okay, so maybe that isn't so simple.

The challenge of speculative fiction is that the world is arguably a more important character than any of the actual people. You think get its tone nailed down before you can do anything else.

I've been doing the summer version of NaNoWriMo. The deadline is midnight tomorrow, and I currently have 3414 words to go. I'm kind of fed up of writing at this point, but I'm glad I've done it. I didn't find out about this summer version until the day I started, so lacked any kind of plan, and that's made it hard to write at times. What I'll be left with will serve as a decently detailed outline so I can go back without the time limit and redo it properly.

I've just decided to actually start a bit of writing. I'd written a few little stories and posted them on Reddit and got quite a lot of positive feedback from them, but they were very silly and very short (the Subreddit in particular has a strict three paragraph limit!). However, I had an idea that I just keep building up in my head and the story just seems to have so much more....there.

So, I'm going to give writing it up as a bigger piece a try and see where that goes. The one I'm currently writing started off as something I misread in someone's feedback! I thought he'd written the phrase 'Demon dusk', but it was actually demon desk. But then I thought the phrase 'Dusky Little Demons' and a whole story just unfolded in front of me.

This is an interesting thread. Seems many people share the same issues I have with creative writing - lack of self-confidence being almost certainly the most prominent. For instance, I've long wanted to create a fresh take on the idea of a Zombie Apocalypse. But where to begin? How to frame it? How to avoid cliches and trite retellings of established tropes? I've even started a few times...and then experienced that familiar moment of clarity when all that I have written seems utterly pointless and very possibly laughable.

And endings. I struggle with endings. If I could just figure out where it is I would want such a tale to go...perhaps I could then make a proper start. But writing even a moderately-sized short story is a major commitment - the idea, the plot, the conceit all have to withstand the actual business of creation, all have to remain sources of enthusiasm throughout the arduous process of actually producing prose.

The most inspiring piece of writing advice I've seen has been given over and over on twitter, blogs and reddit: the First Draft Problem, and it goes thusly: No matter how brilliant a writer you are your first draft will, in all likelihood, be utter shite. But that's the point. The aim of the first draft is to get something, anything down on paper, not to write a perfect version of your story in one go.

This is something I struggled with for years. I'd write something, review it a few days later, hate it and start over. That's simply not how writing works, and even now I get a bit annoyed at all the stories I abandoned at the first hurdle.

My biggest problem is actually sitting down and doing it. After working all day the idea of sitting at a computer for even more hours, possibly spent in frustration just kills my desire to get something down. That and the lack of a plot outline.

Also what are people's thoughts about basing a story in a real and tragic historical event that you have no connection to? Say for example you wanted to base a story in a concentration camp.

Yea I've been reading about the subject (not the holocaust) for a long time mainly because it interests me as a period I just wonder if its maybe a little exploitative to create a form of entertainment from some people's real misery. Especially when you have no desire to provide a comment on what actually happened even though its almost impossible not to when setting a story in a real event in which atrocities were undeniably committed. The other problem is trying to not seem like you're smacking a nation (say the Germans) in the face by writing about it when you have no connection to it and are offering no assessment of it like a historian would. I think it could read as almost sneering down at what these awful people did.

I'm sure it could be done it would just take a level of skill I don't possess.

I used to be quite a prolific writer several years ago, but I became my own worse critic and began and find fault with every sentence. Despite enjoying the act of writing, I still fear the pen. Not literally, I mean. I'm just no good at creatively letting go.

I rarely get past a first draft. I also suffer with the problem that many others do; a wonderful idea in the mind that doesn't seem to translate to paper. It's like you're betraying your own idea.

I have discovered that the biggest killer is reading back what you have written. Since there is no such thing as perfection you cannot do this without finding things to improve. This leads to getting hung up on your failures. My new strategy consists of just writing without rereading at length, only scanning paragraphs for obvious errors.

Like anything, you will become better the more you do it so just keep going and hopefully your technique will naturally fall into shape.

Tafdolphin wrote:The probability of anyone actually reading this is...well. It's quite low. Lower than Madonna's hemline. Lower than Megan Fox's IQ. Lower than the average gross takings of a Shyamalan. But still. Here is something well useful I found:

Due to some great advice I got from Skarjo back in the day I've been working on something for a while now. Mainly due to a lot of free time and boredom but also due to just really wanting to write something in a genre I love. Got a reasonably cool ideas so just chipping away at it.

Not sure if what I've got is actually good or not. But I start Uni in September so keeping myself writing can't be a bad thing.